Prof Gargi Roysircar-Sodowsky gives keynote at the National Multicultural Conference

Professor Gargi Roysircar-Sodowsky was a keynote speaker at the National Multicultural Conference and Summit on Thursday, January fifteenth in New Orleans. Gargi’s speech “Ã¢â‚¬ËœTherapist, Heal Society and Thyself’: Social Justice in Disaster Response Work” covered the major themes and findings of psychological literature on disaster response to Hurricane Katrina. She also talked about self-care and resilience practices participants should learn in order to serve and survive trauma conditions and how attendees can advocate for the psychology profession by initiating or participating in disaster response.

She has worked with international recovery efforts including assisting fishing communities in Southern India hit by the Boxing Day Tsunami of 2004 and the city of Villahermosa, Mexico hit by floods in November 2007. Recently, she was awarded a grant to support building community resilience in the Gulf Coast region of the U.S. hit by hurricanes Katrina and Rita. She also works with the staff of South African and Botswanan orphanages providing education and health services to HIV/AIDS-infected and -affected orphans and women.

Throughout her work, Gargi educates her teams in disaster trauma, culture-centered response skills specific to community disasters, and in self-care to prevent vicarious traumatization or compassion fatigue. In addition to these efforts, Gargi is the editor of the national, peer-reviewed Journal of Multicultural Counseling and Development.

This was the ten-year anniversary for the National Multicultural Conference and Summit (NMCS). The event, according to its web site “convenes students, practitioners, and scholars in psychology and related fields to inform and inspire multicultural theory, research, and practice.”